PostDocing

Hello!

I'm moving to the States at the end of the month, and I obviously need to get health insurance. I was wondering - is travel insurance good for a few months J1 visa (in Indiana)? Sorry, I know this has been asked before, but I couldn't quite work out if travel insurance would definitely cover you if you were a non-tourist. I should be able to get on the University insurance scheme after a few months anyway. Any recommendations for travel insurance, if so?

Bob

You're right, this subject comes up a lot, of people asking about using travel insurance and the answer has always been "no".

You aren't on holiday, so it would be void.

The university should offer something from the get go and if they don't, you would want to find something within 62 days of landing to keep continuous cover.

There are plenty of threads asking about recommendations too, but generally, just search einsurance.com or it might be hyphenated, either way you can find the site easily enough.

The quotes will be shit though because you don't have US credit history and without a full medical history, but you'll get some idea of what the deductibles etc might be.

PostDocing

Thank you for the quick response. So, to be absolutely clear: there is no way to use travel insurance for a short while, even if your visa is non-immigrant and temporary?

scrubbedexpat099

You need work travel insurance not holiday travel insurance.

PostDocing

Ah, thank you.

Bob

But even those would be limited to short periods usually aren't they, so they wouldn't really help the OP much.

scrubbedexpat099

Depends on how long they are going for.

6 months used to be the max.

retzie

In my (admittedly limited) experience, work plans kicked in on the first of the month after I started. I guess it depends how literal you are being about the 'end of the month', but this could possibly be engineered to solve your problem... I suggest speaking to your university now to see if (a) they have such a timeline; and (b) you can get your enrolment moving remotely, so you can minimise the amount of time you are talking about here.

When I came across, I relied on travel insurance (not having investigated particularly thoroughly). I did not need to make any medical claims, but I did claim for lost baggage. Perhaps some enterprising travel insurer is willing to cover relocations specifically...?

More recently, to cover a gap between different employers' plans, I used an Assurant short term plan. Again, didn't make any claims, so can't comment on rates and the like.

PS. Welcome to the life of a postdoc . What's your field?

PostDocing

I'm fairly confident that I can get on the University's scheme after I arrive - though I don't know how quickly. I've been trying to arrange this remotely but a combination of Christmas and the relevant Prof. being away until the end of January has meant I have not been able to do this. From what has been suggested, I will find work-travel insurance that is specifically long term (a few companies do do this), get this for 3 months, and be on either the University's scheme or a US private scheme after that.

I'm a dark matter physicist by trade, viva today in fact...

lucelib

You need to look for a long stay travel insurance policy. I found this website to be the cheapest:

http://www.247travelinsurance.co.uk/...-insurance.asp

I was working, rather than backpacking, but this insurance still covered me.

Bob

You'll have to check to see if any of those policies will be considered creditable coverage, the NHS is, but travel insurance probably isn't. It'll be having it that prevents the insurance from excluding anything to a pre-existing and if they can find an excuse, they will.

retzie

I can't emphasise enough how much I recommend contacting HR directly. In the past, I have found it excruciatingly difficult to extract either information or action out of my academic department. At one point, this involved a series of ****-ups, which almost cost me 4 months of health insurance! If it seems too weird to call HR directly, I would ask your immigration liaison who you should talk to about benefits. Even with your supervisor away, you should be able to find out the nuts and bolts of what needs to be done and get your own part prepared. This will also give you an idea of timelines. I'm sure you've spent enough time around academics to know that the total gain in involving a professor in administrative arrangements is negative. Very negative

Also, a warning about administrators in US universities: for me it was a big shock to discover widespread incompetence. At my 'home' university in Australia, uni admin jobs are well-paid, have exceedingly good conditions and are generally what happens to BA(Hons) graduates (sorry, but it is true!) Here, the pay and conditions are both much worse and the competence you find therein drops commensurately. This is a very broad generalisation and there are certainly exceptions, but you should be prepared!!

Eep, good luck/hope it went well! Mathematician here.

Gillymonkey

Hey, I second the comment about contacting HR directly. We moved over for my husband's post doc and we were enrolled on the health insurance scheme from his official day one as an employee. We used one way travel insurance to cover us until his official start date.

PostDocing

HR was unfortunately my second port of call. After receiving the invitation letter I contacted the University's immigration people who told me to talk to Human resources who told me to talk to the academic in charge of the group. *Sigh*.

Still, I have a few more weeks to try and get on the scheme from the onset. Otherwise, I'm going to see if the travel insurance is acceptable, if not I'll get a local private one for a few months. Worst case scenario I have to get the private insurance for the duration, but I'm trying to avoid that given that University medical insurance seems to be generally pretty good.

Viva went well - very well in fact. I've been spending the last day telling people to do things on "Doctor's orders". I'm sure it will get old, but not today.

retzie

I would try again. In my experience, the title of your position determines most things. At the least, you should be able to find out what information they need from your supervisor - I'm sure it is only a (short) list of options. (You can always use: "Oh, they are at a conference and asked me to find out for them.") It can certainly help save time and faffing around if you know in advance.

You may also need to change the tack of your enquiry, eg. be specific about date coverage starts, whether/when there will be a new faculty benefits meeting, who is the person in your department who files paperwork with HR, etc. Since you are starting in the Spring, you will probably miss out on all the usual orientation stuff, so hopefully they will find some other way of conveying this information.

Ideally, you can avoid the following...

During the first week

You: I need to sort out my health insurance. Can you please speak to HR?
Supervisor: Oh, yes, you definitely need health insurance here. What do I need to do?
You: Speak to HR.
Supervisor: What do they need to know?
You: They said the academic in charge of the unit needed to speak to them about me.
Supervisor: Aren't we doing the same thing we did for <last postdoc>?
You: I don't know. What did you do for <last postdoc>? I think you'll need to speak to them.
Supervisor: Doesn't <department admin person you've never spoken to before> know?
You: I don't know <department admin person you've never spoken to before>.
Supervisor: Oh, you should speak to her. She'll know what we did for <last postdoc>.

<department admin person you've never spoken to before> confirms we are doing the same thing as for <last postdoc>, which involved Supervisor speaking to HR...

etc.

The punchline is always that there is a perfectly good system that could have been applied immediately to save you hassle and money. However, there is some unwritten rule that you must never know about it until too late

Don't forget "Trust me, I'm a doctor"!